


A Lazy Joxter's Final Repose

by Doceo_Percepto



Series: Bendy's Murderous Adventure Across Moominvalley [29]
Category: Mumintroll | Moomins Series - Tove Jansson
Genre: AU where Lazy gets a kinder death, Friendship, Gen, accepting death, mentions of physical and sexual assault
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-04
Updated: 2018-06-04
Packaged: 2019-05-18 06:40:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,749
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14847705
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Doceo_Percepto/pseuds/Doceo_Percepto
Summary: The Joxter has come to the end of his life. He and a long-time friend spend one final afternoon together.





	A Lazy Joxter's Final Repose

**Author's Note:**

> This is an alternate take on how the Joxter might die, and it's a much more positive happy one. However, this also takes place in an AUy sort of realm where Happy ends up dying pretty fast / doesn't join Bendy and the Joxter's nice little entourage. The only reason for that is because I wrote this before I finished the story Happy, and I wasn't sure where I was gonna take it at the time.

Every year, winter became more difficult to endure. The chill delved deeper and deeper into his bones, and no matter how much fluff or blankets he added to his canoe-nest, he could never truly find warmth. The cold lingered at his core, in a way that hinted, _you will never be warm again._

His joints ached. Nowadays, slogging through the snow tired him before he even began to do it. Foraging for food, even in the nearby wild berry bushes that had grown to enormous, healthy size in his lifespan, became an exhausting, nearly insurmountable task. He was, most of all, _tired_. Being a Joxter, he was familiar with sleepiness, and had always preferred a nap to almost any other task (perhaps, of course, barring those tasks involving Snufkins). But this was a new, pervasive tiredness. A weariness that not even a good, long sleep could banish. That weariness was deepest this winter. Deep enough that he thought he may not want to leave his nest at all. He did not want to eat, did not want to drink. He did not want to wake up.

When Spring came, with new bright greens sprouting from the earth, and eager young brooks bubbling over rocks, and the soil smelling fresh and full of new life, the Joxter’s tiredness did not alleviate. It stayed, along with the cold, deep in his bones. That’s when he knew. And quietly, he accepted.

 

 

One final time, the Joxter ascended up a path of dirt, brush, and stone, to a ridge that overlooked all of Moominvalley. Many a time he had come this way, to take in all the beauty of the land, and now just as then, he had company that ascended with him, an ageless friend that he had known now for more than half his own life. When they reached the top, they sat together on the ridge, and gazed out over the land sprawled before them. It was a perfect, peaceful day: cool but clear-skied.

It was, the Joxter felt, the most perfect day to die.

“I’ve lived an awfully long time,” he started with.

Bendy, for that was his friend, gave him a nervous look.

“I should think,” the Joxter added, “that from here, things will only go downward.” He took a deep, reverential inhale, treasuring the sweetness of Spring, and the keenness with which he could still smell it. “If I am allowed to go on, I will wilt and shrivel away like a dying willow tree. Dry and gnarled and brittle. I’d rather not see that day come.”

Bendy looked down silently. He had been with the Joxter over the winter, and he had seen the weariness. “You want to die,” he said, unsurprised, unhappy.

The Joxter hummed. “We aren’t given much choice in the matter. I’d rather not die. But death is looking for me.”

“What am I gonna do, after?”

“Anything you like. Stay here, if it suits you.”

Bendy leaned against the Joxter’s side. In the valley below, a flock of birds startled from the trees and fluttered like specks of ash before settling again. “I don’t think I’ll stay,” Bendy said.

“Mh?”

“Maybe I’ll go back home.”

“Will you take the string of harmonicas with you?” the Joxter asked.

“Probably not.”

“They are only things. They’ll do you no good, in the end.”

“I guess someone will find them and take them.”

The Joxter made a noise of assent.

There was a long, peaceful silence. Nothing made life so vivid as knowing it would shortly be gone. With this in mind, the Joxter admired the valley below. He admired the frilly glittering lace of the ocean wrapping around the shore; just looking at it, he could nearly smell the salty air, fresh and biting and invigorating. He admired the rich verdant leaves of the trees that had been adults before he was born, and now would live on long after his death. So too would the mountain ridges that reared up at the far side of the valley, with caps dusted in white.

What a humbling emotion.

“I’ve had a magnificent life,” the Joxter murmured. “Such beautiful sights. A wealth of food and drink, more than a Joxter needs.” A smile crinkled at his lips. “And more pleasures than one could have ever expected.”

Bendy looked up at him. “Do you want me to bring ya one more Snufkin?”

The Joxter shook his head. It had been a while, since their last one – over the years, the frequency with which they enjoyed Snufkins had significantly reduced. The fire in the Joxter’s belly had cooled, the ferocious impatience of his youth had calmed. He still enjoyed, on the occasion, watching his friend eviscerate and devour Snufkins with the same tireless energy he’d always possessed, but the Joxter himself rarely elected to participate, especially in these last few years.

He’d had his fun. And he’d indulged. Recklessly, impatiently, he’d indulged in the joys of blood and sex, and more than once put himself at risk in his pleasure.

The thought now made him smile, and he concluded, “I’d like you to do it.”

“Do what?”

“Kill me.”

Bendy was silent for a long moment. Then, softly. “I’ve thought about it before.”

“Really?”

Bendy grinned shyly. “You look like a Snufkin, ya know.”

The Joxter chuckled. His calloused hands brought out a pipe with the mouthpiece chewed, and he lit it. “So I _did_ have reason to fear, when I was younger.”

“You weren’t scared.”

“Sometimes I was.”

“Nuh-uh.”

The Joxter laughed, until it turned into coughing, and then, sobered, he dangled his pipe at the tips of his fingers and frowned at the valley below. “But I am serious. There is no romance in a gradual, wasting death. Left to my own devices, I fear I will only get slower and weaker, and I will lose my mind as well as my body, until one day I don’t get out of my canoe at all.”

Bendy made a distressed keen.

“It sounds just awful, doesn’t it?” The Joxter took several thoughtful puffs from his pipe. “Alas, it’s a quick death I want.”

“I don’t wanna kill you.”

“You’ll want to watch me decay even less. Tell me you’ll do it. When I ask it of you.”

“When will you ask?”

“Soon, I expect.”

Bendy made another unhappy noise, and the Joxter rubbed soothingly between his horns. “Do you remember Nobody?” he asked.

“Nobody?”

“Tell me you remember. The Snufkin we named Nobody. A little thing – small even for a Snufkin. Such vivid green eyes.”

“Oh, yes!” Bendy seemed grateful at the subject change.

The Joxter tamped his pipe out, and placed a windcap over the pipe bowl. He put the pipe aside. “Such a feral thing. Never had a Snufkin fight so hard before.”

“A whole lot of blunt force trauma sure slowed him down, though.”

“You really were too harsh,” the Joxter said kindly.

“The state of his skull didn’t stop you from sticking your dick down his throat,” Bendy replied, grinning.

“His mouth was open, darling. What did you expect?”

“It was open because his jaw was broken.”

“Exactly. What an opportunity.”

Bendy let out a high-pitched giggle. “He was a lot of fun. I really didn’t mean ta break so many bones, but it worked out great.”

“It did.” The Joxter stroked down Bendy’s back; the demon instinctively curled his tail around the Joxter’s hand, and the Joxter squeezed it lightly, as much as his arthritic fingers would allow.

“We kept Happy, too,” Bendy said.

“Happy…”

“He had dark eyes, remember? They were big and looked a lot like a Joxter’s. And he was _always_ grinning.”

“Oh!” The Joxter cooed. “That was such a long time ago. I did love him dearly.”

“Me too. He was one of my favorites.”

“You got attached to every one we kept,” the Joxter remarked playfully, rubbing his thumb lightly over Bendy’s tail.

“Well, yeah, but I _especially_ liked him. He was the first one we kept. Firsts are always so distinct. And also I liked that he smiled.”

“He was very pretty,” the Joxter murmured, feeling a sleepy coil of heat in his belly from the memory.

“What about Sunshine?”

The Joxter barked a sharp laugh. “The one that thought he’d earn his freedom, if he tortured other Snufkins?”

“Yes, him! He was hilarious.”

“Poor Sunshine. How endearing, to see so much false hope in one little Snufkin.”

“We could get another now,” Bendy said hopefully.

“No.”

“But-“

The Joxter shook his head. “I’d say you'd understand, when it’s your time to die, but…” The Joxter sighed. “I’m tired. I’ve been tired a long time. Won’t you promise me? If it’s anyone, I’d like it to be you.”

Bendy gazed up at him mournfully. “… Okay. I promise.”

For a long, long while, they sat in silence. The breeze whispered through the trees. Critters of the forest chittered and chirruped, whistled and sang, but all of it went on, apart from and uncaring of the two individuals on the ridge. Likewise, all of it would continue on, none the wiser, once they both were gone. The sun dipped down. Deep purples and oranges lit the horizon, and reflected in the tumultuous waves. The forest below darkened.

The Joxter clasped his hands in his lap, squeezed them as if to wring out nerves. “You’ll make it quick, won’t you?”

“Shouldn’t we say something? Like, goodbyes?”

“We said everything in silence.”

Bendy made a noise of reluctant agreement.

“Well.” The Joxter let out a shaky breath. “That's all, then. I'm ready.”

There was a heartbeat of hesitation. Then ink bubbled and dripped and grew, until there was a monster standing there, baring teeth that could easily rip a man in half – and had done so, many a time. The Joxter’s senses sharpened, briefly, as they once had been sharp in his youth. He felt abnormally conscious of the evening breeze prickling at his skin, of the hair sticking to the base of his neck, of the cicadas chirruping in the forest behind him. The air smelled flower-rich, with the edge of bitter acrid ink. Sweat gathered beneath his overcoat.

"So this is how they felt," he murmured, and then smiled wanly. "No, I suppose it was quite different for them. They didn't have any choice in the matter."

Two trembling hands raised, and he cupped the underside of Bendy's face, not unlike drawing him into a kiss.

"I'm ready."

 

 


End file.
